During building and home construction, the finishing of cornice or crown moldings is a difficult, expensive and time-consuming process. The finishing process of both inside and outside cornice or crown molding corners experience similar difficulties. In both cases, two segments of molding having ends which typically meet but do not touch at the corner must be provided with a visually aesthetic finish. The area between the molding segments must be finished in a manner that results in the appearance of a smooth and unbroken molding which wraps about the inside or outside corner without a break, gap or discontinuity.
The prior art method of finishing such gaps between cornice or crown molding elements is to fill the gap area with drywall mud and to allow the mud to set-up. Once sufficiently hardened to work with, a skilled tradesman is required to carve, sand and polish the set drywall mud to conform with the appearance of the cornice or crown molding segments on either side of the gap. Due to the nature of the aesthetic pattern on the surface of many such moldings, as well as the nature of the thin and sharp corner required, it is typically the case that even the work of the best craftsman still results in noticeable imperfections.
A less labor-intensive method seen in the prior art is to use decorative molding corner caps. Such caps totally enclose the area of intersection between two cornice or crown molding segments, and thereby hide the gap area between the two segments. Unfortunately, there are several problems with this method as well. First, different decorative molding corner caps would be required for each cornice or crown molding pattern. Second, different molding corner caps would be required for inside and outside corners, and for corners of any angle other than 90 or 270 degrees. Third, unless the corner cap is made of the same material as the cornice or crown molding, the appearance is somewhat degraded. And fourth, due to the size of the corner cap, which must necessarily be larger than the molding segments, some aesthetic degradation results. This is because the smooth and continuous lines of a first molding segment do not directly continue with the second molding segment, but instead are broken by the molding cap.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for a cornice or crown molding accessory that is economical to use, that allows rapid formation of the finish between two segments of cornice or crown molding and that results in a level of finish that is aesthetically pleasing and superior to that which is achieved by prior art methods.